Tuesday, 6 October 2009

You Can't Get The Staff

Well, you can, but with the Hinchliffe range you have to be prepared to do a bit of hacking in order to add a bit of variety.

Inspired by the recent Bill Gaskin postings i knocked these out recently - they may not be to the same standard but i'm fairly pleased with them. They are all Hinchliffe figures (apart from the grey which is a Steve Hezzlewood designed RSM piece) converted to some degree (e.g. the bloke on the grey started life as Thomas Picton...talk about coming down in the world...).

Thanks chaps - i think the camera has been quite kind to these figures though.

Ian - the grey was quite easy...paynes grey oil applied over a matt white undercoat (mix your oil with some liquin so it'll dry within a couple of hours), this will look horrible but don't despair, and set it aside for an hour so the oil becomes tacky. Then attack it with a small piece of sponge. Dab away gently at 90 degrees to the horse, and do this to every part of the casting that you can reach. It's up to you how much paint you remove - i left a lot on in this case, but you can remove most of it to produce a very white (old) grey. Always go easy on the legs and muzzle. Set it aside to dry. I usually add a second coat of paint to darken the legs and muzzle (though not in this case) - blend this in with a sponge. You can also reinforce shadow areas with more paynes grey applied conventionally with a brush. So essentially it's a variation on the oil wipe technique - only you dab rather than wipe.cheers.

You are cordially invited to "knock out" as many of my figures as you like...in fact I have started a special lead pile just for you! Lovely stuff, the AWI does look good. So many plans, so little time!